


How to Survive

by Prentice



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Depression, Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Returning Home, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, War Veteran Bucky Barnes, vaguely suicidal thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-07
Updated: 2017-04-07
Packaged: 2018-10-16 03:52:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10563135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prentice/pseuds/Prentice
Summary: The funny thing was, Bucky never figured he’d make it this far. He talked a good game, of course. Even managed to sound halfway convincing even to himself most days, but really, he just never figured it.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Please note the tags and take them seriously. Bucky is not in a good place mentally in this fic and while he doesn't outright plan or want or even think deeply about committing suicide, there is definitely an attitude of his thinking he probably shouldn't have survived and a general disregard for his own life. 
> 
> So, again, take the tags seriously. 
> 
> Additionally, I've made a few word choices that might not necessarily fit but they are purely intentional for characterization purposes. You'll probably know them when you see them but if any of them are too much of eyesore let me know.

The funny thing was, Bucky never figured he’d make it this far. He talked a good game, of course. Even managed to sound halfway convincing even to himself most days, but really, he just never figured it.

It wasn’t like he...well.

He didn’t have a death wish or nothin’. He’d seen far too many good men and women with one of those go down burning and it just didn’t signify with him and his way of thinking. Not really.

Sure, there might’ve been a few things about him that at first glance _seemed_ like they were similar to those poor bastards, but that didn’t mean he _was_ one of them. He didn’t want to die. Didn’t want to take stupid risks just for the hell of it. For the thrill.

It was just, he never figured it would be like this.

For him.

He wasn’t…

He wasn’t the going home type, if that made sense. It probably didn’t; never had, really. He’d long since given up trying to explain it to anyone; there really weren’t the right words out there for it anyway.

It was just a feeling. A sense of clarity about certain things in his life. A certain clarity about a lot of things in his life, actually.

He wasn’t the going home type. Never had been. Never would be.

It was just a fact.

He’d known that from the moment he’d signed up; serene as anything, even as other men’s hands had shook and trembled, fingers clumsy around the pen. He didn’t mind. It was a simple enough thing after all.

He wasn’t the type to get to go home. He wasn’t the _kind_. He didn’t get to do it.

Not unless it was in a pine box.

And he was okay with that.

He was good.

It didn’t upset him any. Maybe it should’ve. He might not’ve had a death wish but that didn’t mean he was ready to kick the bucket just yet.

It was just, and he’d tried to explain this before, mostly to Steve, who hadn’t – couldn’t – wouldn’t’ve understood anyway, that he wasn’t afraid of dyin’. Not like some people were – and that had nothin’ to do with any imaginin’ of pearly gates or baby cherubs or holy choirs waiting for him on the other end of everything. Truth be told, he wasn’t even sure he believed in any of that bullshit anyway.

Well, at least not in the baby cherubs part anyhow. He’d never understood what was supposed to be soothin’ about ‘em. Fat little babies flying around on fluffy white wings. No matter what his ma might’ve said, he just couldn’t wrap his mind around why _that_ of all things would be pacifying to the recently departed soul.

Either way, however, he figured that was the easy part of it all anyway. The dying bit he meant. Might be messy, of course, and not particularly peaceful, especially for someone in his line of work, but it’d still be easy.

It was everything else that was complicated.

Which was why he just – he never figured it. Making it back home. Not in a pine box like he’d always thought he would be, but somewhere close to it. Tubes and pins and wires stuck in him and to him for the first few months; half-mad from the pain and the fear and the confusion.

All but mute from all the screaming he’d done the first few hours after Steve and the boys had dragged him back from whatever hell he’d fallen into. Little shock-shock-shocks of leftover electricity dancing over his skin like knives, brain scrambled and blank in places he didn’t even know. Pain like nothing he’d ever felt before screaming down one side and up the other, crackling inside his skull.

He wasn’t – he didn’t know much. Not at first. He just kind of…drifted there. Brief snatches of awareness eaten away by pain and confusion, by foreign hands touching him and foreign voices talking to him.

It was…bad.

There was no other way of describin’ it. It was bad – awful, in ways he couldn’t even begin to explain and it took a while to come back to himself. How long, he didn’t know. He’d tried to ask, at first, the absence of Steve and the boys eating away at him, but nobody wanted to say.

He wasn’t sure why. No one wanted to say anything, talking at him and around him, some of them not even wanting to look him in the eye, and it was harder than anything to not just scream himself to silence once more. To not slip back into whatever drift along he could find and remain there. 

He didn’t of course, no matter how tempting it was, and grit his teeth against the pain and the emotion and the whatever the fuck else that came along. Physical therapy, counseling, blank spots in his head and screaming silence from everyone that came in and came out.

He – it wasn’t easy.

Not like dyin’.

Instead, it was complicated, ugly. Learning to be back home again. Learning to damn well _walk_ again, and not just stumble around, lopsided, and uneven. The shock of losing a limb as bad as the phantom pain and feel of substance that sometimes still messed with him; something panicky and cold wrapping up around him when he realized it wasn’t there anymore.

It was like spiders on his skin sometimes. Creeping up and crashing down on him. Everything a blur until it wasn’t. Everything a buzz until it wasn’t. Everything a goddamn shit show until it _wasn’t_.

It took time of course. A lot of it. Coming back to himself.

It wasn’t easy. Nothing at all like they showed in the pictures. It was hard and ugly, messy like shattered glass all over the clean floor and it took time to accept that he was…home.

Again.

When he shouldn’t be.

Not like Steve.

Not like the boys.

They should’ve been home. The Commandos. They should’ve been here – or he should’ve been _there_. With them. Fighting by their side, dusty and dirty and happier than he’d ever been.

Not back here, stateside, twisted and tangled up with emotions he couldn’t’ve begun to name. Terrified of shit that didn’t even make sense. Learning how to fucking _live_ again, when he never figured he’d make it this far to begin with.

Without Steve.

Without the boys.

Without…

Without a fucking clue of how he was gonna do this. How he was gonna live. How he was gonna _survive_.  

Here.

Home.

Brooklyn.

He didn’t know.

He just – he didn’t know…

…and he was pretty sure that scared him more than any fucking thing else.


End file.
